Posted on 02/26/2006 11:12:43 AM PST by alumleg
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are among the most popular and scientifically sophisticated agencies in the U.S. government. Not only do they do good science, they do dramatic, risky, and even romantic things--capturing comet dust, sending surveyors to Mars, flying airplanes into hurricanes, and providing images of impending weather events. They are full of productive, respected scientists. We have published papers from groups at both agencies and have been proud to do so.
But these days, we're trying to figure out what is happening to serious science at NOAA and NASA. In this space a month ago, I described some of the research that supports a relationship between hurricane intensity and increased water temperatures. Two empirical studies, one published in Science and one in Nature, show that hurricane intensity has increased with oceanic surface temperatures over the past 30 years. The physics of hurricane intensity growth, worked out by Kerry Emanuel at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has clarified and explained the thermodynamic basis for these observations.
Yet a NOAA Web site** denies any relationship between global climate change and hurricane strength. It attributes the latter instead to "tropical multidecadal signals" affecting climate variability. Emanuel has tested this relationship and presented convincing evidence against it in recent seminars. As for the many NOAA scientists who may agree with Emanuel, the U.S. Department of Commerce (the executive agency that NOAA is part of) has ordered them not to speak to reporters or present papers at meetings without departmental review and approval.
That's bad enough, but it turns out that things are even worse at NASA, where a striking front-page story by Andy Revkin in the New York Times (28 January 2006) details the agency's efforts to put a gag on James Hansen, direct or of the agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, after a talk he gave at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco in December 2005. His sin was that he pointed out that the climate change signal is now so strong, 2005 having been the warmest year in the past century, that the voluntary measures proposed by the administration are likely to be inadequate.
Hansen was told that there would be "dire consequences" if such statements continued. The Times story identifies two NASA public affairs officials, Dean Acosta and George Deutsch, as responsible for delivering this news and insisting that Hansen's "supervisors" would have to stand in for him at public appearances. Those will presumably take place in approvable venues and certainly not on National Public Radio (NPR). Deutsch is reported to have rejected a Hansen interview requested by NPR on the grounds that it was "the most liberal news outlet in the country."
For at least two reasons, this event may establish a new high-water mark for bureaucratic stupidity. First, Hansen's views on this general subject have long been widely available; he thinks climate change is due to anthropogenic sources, and he's discouraged that we're not doing more about it. For NASA to lock the stable door when this horse has been out on the range for years is just silly. Second, Hansen's history shows that he just won't be intimidated, and he has predictably told the Times that he will ignore the restrictions. The efforts by Acosta and Deutsch are reminiscent of the slapstick antics of Curley and Moe: a couple of guys stumbling off to gag someone who the audience knows will rip the gag right off.
These two incidents are part of a troublesome pattern to which the Bush administration has become addicted: Ignore evidence if it doesn't favor the preferred policy outcome. Above all, don't let the public get an idea that scientists inside government disagree with the party line. The new gag rules support the new Bush mantra, an interesting inversion of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfield's view on war: "You don't make policy with the science you have. You make policy with the science you WANT." But the late-breaking good news is that NASA Administrator Griffin has said that there will be no more of this nonsense, and Deutsch, the 24-year-old Bush appointee sent to muzzle Hansen, has left the agency abruptly after his résumé turned out to be falsified. A change of heart? Stay tuned.
10.1126/science.1125749
**www.magazine.noaa.gov/stories/mag184.htm
How quaint! Your naivete is showing! I've published hundreds of scientific articles and have been a scientist for over 40 years. If you think Science is still considered a major journal then you are one of the most gullible people on the planet.
I agree with an earlier comment that deductive science is doomed to deadend. We must find a way to get the government out of science.
" Are you really so sure you can neglect your children's future so cavalierly?"
Are you really so sure that mankind can control the weather?
I am sure that we have vastly increased the land devoted to trees in this country in the last 40 years as we have banked a lot of land that was formerly farmed. this has been an agressive government policy particularily on exhausted cotton land of the SE.
But, think of it this way. If Orwell warned that enemies and war keep regimes in power, imagine how desirable it would be to create a fear about an invisible threat like CO2. The public cannot see it or assess the threat themselves. So, once the experts agree, it is full steam ahead. No controversy or annoying bloggers to get in the way of totalitarian control.
Come back in maybe 20 or 30 years when you get some real experience concerning critical thinking. You are so gullible that you actually believe something is true just because it happens to get published. Let me tell you something... go to any science library. Look around at all the journals. Guess what? Probably close to 80% of what is contained within them is garbage science by today's standards. In another 20 years, what is published today will suffer the same fate.
You think you know it all, but in the final analysis, you don't know anything other than what someone else has tricked you into believing is important. And if you think scientists don't lie for personal gain or for a cause, then you haven't been paying attention to what is going on recently in stem cell and cloning research. Many scientists have political and personal agendas. They often hide or fabricate information or squelch the publication of information from other sources if it is contrary to their personal agenda.
If you are going to read scientific studies, then you need to sharpen your skills at critical thinking and not just accept them verbatim. When you understand all the problems with a theory as well as you understand the strengths, and when you know the character and honesty of the scientist spouting the information, then maybe you can effectively argue your position.
In the last 40 years in the US, maybe. In the last 200, I don't think so.
Are you in Mo? I lived and taught all over MO, and I used to ask my students why there were bears on the state seal. I know how much the landscape has changed since Lewis and Clark. the question puzzles anyone N of I 70. Get into the Ozarks, though, and people tell bear hunting stories.
That's fair. I think you need to break down the causes carefully though. There is historical and theoretical support for the fact that some of the extra CO2 and methane in the air comes from the warming, not the other way around. No doubt man has added to the CO2 too. But you need to determine the precise role that CO2 plays in "forcing" more water vapor into the air. This is the area that has the least uncertainty especially the computer models. Without relatively precise knowledge about how warming is caused by CO2, you can't answer #3. We aren't done answering #2 yet.
Google "journal science" junk and get 47,700 matches.
Latest issue of Infinite Energy Magazine : Global Warming, Fact or Fiction : by William H. Cantrell, Phd : Climate Change and Clearing the Air : test questions : 1)The last ice age was known as "the Little Ice Age"and it occurred a)during the 17th and the 19th centuries b)10,000 yrs ago c)100,000 yrs ago d)over 1,000,000 yrs ago e)during the carter administration....2)During the past 3,000 yrs the earth's climate has at times been much WARMER than it is today a)true b)false...3)Based on Carbon 14 dating during the past 7,000 yrs, how many times has the earth's climate been much COLDER than it is today? a)10 times b)twice c)once....4)During the last 20 yrs with the highest recorded levels of atmospheric CO2, temperatures have a)decreased b)remained the same c)increased....5)As CO2 levels increase, overall plant growth rates will a)easily double b)decline slightly c)decrease significantly, indicating a positive feedback spiral....6)The continental US is a a)net sink for carbon emissions b)huge source of carbon emissions...7)Standing timber in the US a)has increased by more than 30% since 1950 b)has decreased to less than 30% of 1950 levels )is expected to decline to 2% by the end of the 21st century......and on up to #14)While the economy has increased dramatically, concentrations of major air pollutants in the Western World have a)decreased dramatically b)leveled off c)increased dramatically.....All answers are a) of course...his point : water and water vapor is the main driver of global climate, not CO2. Atmospheric science is a very complex subject but again, what's so BAD about the arctic warming up? What's so BAD about climate changes here and there? This fundamental assumption that the climate is supposed to be static is NONSENSE, it's always been a'changing, always will, roll with the punches, it's called EVOLUTION.
Because it has been politicized by people who want to limit fossil fuel consumption for various other reasons. Also there is an international bureaucracy that will do very well for itself and various authoritarian regimes redistributing wealth. The emission trading scheme will really amount to a tax on capitalism.
Science hasn't shown that CO2 causes warming. There is ample evidence that warming causes CO2 increases (both the historical record and chemical mechanisms). Science hasn't shown how increases in CO2 lead to increases in water vapor which cause warming. The GW models depend on that and it is only a hypothesis underlying models shown to have a poor predictive track record. Science can show a net CO2 increase from mankind, that's not political and not disputed except the amount.
As others have mentioned, come back when you have an education in the matter. Don't just spout dogma and expect anyone to take you seriously. Try to understand the agenda behind the politics. Mostly just try to find out exactly what "forcing" is. When you feel you understand it, let me know and we can debate it.
> Now that is a pejorative assessment painting with a broad brush stroke. Demonization is a very lame debate tactic.
I am only replying because you correctly recognized my rhetoric. I have only one word for Rush Limbaugh, and that's stfu. As for the rest of the knee jerk conservatives, the word is desertification. Tell your grandchildren I told 'em so.
You said you had questions about mankinds effect on GW, (we'll all agree there is GW), and you questioned what we should do about it. Now you seem to be predicting disaster. Are you saying that we will cause such a disaster? Then you must have the answer to question 2. If desertification is your answer, then how will the models work which add water vapor to produce warming. If it's just desertification somewhere, but not everywhere, why don't we move farming to the wetter areas? Are you seriously saying there will be desertification over large areas?
I don't think those are knee jerk questions do you?
If you listened to Rush, this is his opinion as well. So if your opinion matches his (no matter if you researched it yourself), I should not listen to anything else you say, since you are a mind-numbed "dittohead" that only thinks what Rush tells him to.
I am only replying because you correctly recognized my rhetoric. I have only one word for Rush Limbaugh, and that's stfu. As for the rest of the knee jerk conservatives, the word is desertification. Tell your grandchildren I told 'em so.
What causes desertification? Is it a natural process? Is there less water on earth? Are there places gaining wetlands? You sound like you'd rather demean the person than take on the argument. So, as for whatever you are (greenpeace, liberal, non-knee-jerk conservative, moderate wind-shifter) I don't care, I try to keep an open mind...but I would never be open to your kind of argument.
No I said scientists have questions. I am convinced. (Don't tell Rush :) I have been watching Winter disappear from northern Vermont 7 mi from Canadian border 1800-4000 feet for 25 years. We're screwed. I hope and pray I am wrong.
> What causes desertification? Is it a natural process?
Don't know (but I have an idea what), don't want it.
> I would never be open to your kind of argument.
I wasn't arguing. Let the scientists do that. Just don't listen to Limbaugh.
You're young and you have plenty of good winters ahead of you. I watched winter near Boston disappear from the 70's into the 80's only to come roaring back in the 90's. Of course a lot of those phenomenon depend on the polar and tropical jets and not the climate per se so even a warming overall climate can be snowy.
But you are right about the region, it has been getting warmer in the winter and less snowy, less ice on the lakes, longer growing season, etc. All these could be good or bad as you mentioned in your first post. They could be bad if your prophesy of desertification comes true, but so far the opposite has been happening in New England.
L
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